“Where do you go to school?” she asked.
“Homeschooled,” he said. “Just got my GED.”
“Are you planning to go to college?” Her moms had been talking about college for the entire past year. If she hadn’t come to Vermont, she was certain she’d have been brought on a dozen college tours. As it was, she didn’t know what she wanted to do or where she wanted to go. She figured she’d just apply to as many places as she could manage and then work it out after that, depending on who said yes.
It was better than getting her heart set on a college that was only going to say no. She’d made that kind of mistake already, with Ethan.Don’t wish for what you can’t have.Besides, it was a Future Calisa problem anyway.
“Been thinking of applying to the University of Vermont.”
“And?”
“And?” he repeated.
“You can’t just apply to one,” Calisa said. She thought of her guidance counselor, a woman with perfect makeup, straight-as-hay hair, and a flower brooch on every blazer. She’d have had fits at the idea of any senior applying to only one school. She had very strong opinions about applications and a track record of being nearly always right. “What if you don’t get in?”
He shrugged. “Then I won’t go.”
“Huh.” She tried not to sound like she was judging him, but she was totally judging him. Who applied to only one college and just trusted fate? Your future was a very large thing to leave to chance. And shouldn’t he have already applied, if he had his GED? Unless he was taking a gap year? “What does your dad think you should do?”
Jack looked down at his soup. “We haven’t talked about it much. He knows I don’t want to leave the inn—not when it needs me—and he’s fine if I delay college. What I want…” He took a deep breath. “What I want is to convince Auntie Zee to hire me full-time as a permanent employee. She hasn’t committed to that yet, even though…Well, what about your moms?”
He said moms, plural. Hehadbeen listening when she’d talked about them.He listens. Not just about goat cheese.It was a very nice trait. She couldn’t help but like him a bit more. Just as a friend.
“Theysaythey just want me to be happy,” Calisa said, “but Mom-Kate has made a spreadsheet of all potential colleges within driving distance of Brooklyn, and Mom-Elise just keeps buying books about how to decide what to do with your life and leaves them around, as if she’s being subtle…. And I don’t know what I want to do with my life. Crystal—she’s one of my friends back in Brooklyn—gives annoyingly good advice: she says I need to knowwhoI am before I can knowwhatI want.” She stirred the soup and spoke directly to the noodles. “That was one of the reasons that I liked being with Ethan so much. When I was with him, I thought I knew who I was. I was who he saw me as. Someone he wanted to spend time with. Except apparently that wasn’t enough.Iwasn’t enough.” She didn’t know why all these words were spilling out of her or why he would care, except that she knew he’d listen. She stopped talking, looked up from the soup to his face, and waited for him to reply with some kind of platitude or make an excuse to leave.
But he didn’t.
He swallowed a spoonful of soup and then asked, “Who do you want to be?”
“Really, really good question.”
“Yeah. I know. Please don’t askmeto answer it,” Jack said. “It just seemed like the right question to ask…I mean, since it’s your choice. Not your moms’. Not that guy’s, Ethan, who I’m going to assume is your ex?”
“Cheating ex, yes.” She lifted another spoonful of soup, then lowered it. It was supremely delicious soup, but thinking about how it all ended with Ethan made her not want to eat any of it. She wondered how she was supposed to stop thinking about him. Cleaning had helped distract her, but it hadn’t excised him completely—he was still creeping into her thoughts all the time.Time, yes. I need time.Time away from him, from them, from everyone who knew who she was and had opinions on who she was supposed to be. She needed to take a power washer to the whole inn and blast Ethan out of her heart. “I need to stay longer than three days.”
“If you’d like, I could vouch for you.”
“You’d do that?” She met his eyes.He has really nice eyes.Open and honest. The kind of eyes that made you feel like you were seeing straight into his soul. She was absolutelynotlooking for a rebound guy, but she liked thinking she could make a friend.
“You can make pancakes and heat up soup,” he said, scooping more soup as if in proof. “Also, how you handled that lizard shows you can deal with the unexpected, which is, like, halfof the work here. But I have to warn you: Auntie Zee never listens to anyone. Least of all me. You’d have better luck asking the cat.”
“Does the cat have a name?” She’d been meaning to ask.
“Portia. But don’t actually ask her. That was a joke. Also, don’t try to pet her. You’ll lose your hand. Or at least bleed copious amounts, and it’s hard to get bloodstains out of stuff.”
He worries a lot.She resolved not to become one of the things he worried about. She’d find her own way to convince Auntie Zee to let her stay. Still…his view of her had clearly changed, which was nice. She’d have to remember to thank the lizard.
—
The next day, Calisa started on the dining room. She was fairly certain there was a table underneath the layer of dust, and it was absurd that no one had thrown out the very dead flowers in the vase. As she was tossing the brittle blooms into the kitchen trash and filling the vase with hot sudsy water to soap, Auntie Zee entered. “You’re still here? I said three days.”
“It’s day two,” Calisa said.
“You arrived day one, yesterday was day two, and today is day three,” Auntie Zee said.
She heard footsteps thump down the stairs, and then Jack jogged into the kitchen. “Calisa, I found a cookbook!” He waved a tattered book with a gingham cover in the air and then froze. “Oh hi, Auntie Zee.” He looked as if he wanted to pivot and bolt.
“Jackson Thomas Jones.” Auntie Zee bit off each of his names.
